Spring – or at least some dry days – is upon us, and with it the chance to get outside. This is a new piece by FGB (web) on the shutters of what was Quality Life massage parlour, in a row of mostly abandoned shop-fronts in (upper) North Street.
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The mallard duck is common throughout Ireland (Birdwatch), including on Belfast’s Lagan (Geograph). These drakes are on an Annadale Embankment electrical box, painted by Katriona (web) as part of the latest round of painted electrical boxes in the Belfast Canvas project.
With organisational support from Daisy Chain (web).
Also included is an earlier (2023) south Belfast box, from the Lisburn Road, by Zippy (web).
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The 21st Rory Gallagher International Tribute Festival (web) starts on Thursday May 29th in Ballyshannon, the County Donegal town in which the guitarist was born in 1948. In addition to the festival, Gallagher is remembered in the town by both a mural and a statue.
The mural is in Main Street, Ballyshannon/Béal Átha Seanaıdh; the statue is on The Mall/An Mál, next to The Faeries. As of January, 2025, there is also a statue of Gallagher in Belfast.
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This is an extra-large (two-storey) wall-painting by Alexandra Demian (Fb | Seedhead) at the entrance to Erneside shopping centre in Enniskillen. She will be painting at this year’s (2025) Hit The North (line-up) in Belfast in early May.
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The “West End Horse” in Bundoran was painted by John Deegan (Fb) in 2013 (Discover Bundoran). The “Big wave” on the wall of Madden’s is by Nik Purdy of Blow Designs (ig), who also did murals of James Connolly in Sligo and of local literary figures in Carrick-On-Shannon.
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“Up the airy mountain/Down the rushy glen/We daren’t go a-hunting,/For fear of little men.//Wee folk, good folk,/Trooping all together,/Green jacket, red cap,/White owl’s feather! – Wm Allingham”
Customs-officer, magazine editor, and poet William Allingham was born in Ballyshannon, Co Donegal, in 1824, and his ashes – brought back from London – are interred in St Anne’s church in the town (WP). “The Faeries” (poetry.com) was first published in his 1850 collection Poems (UCC) and remains a staple of children’s and mythological collections.
The art shown here is on The Mall/An Mál in Ballyshannon/Béal Átha Seanaıdh.
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Paper x Clips (web) – providing queer books and haircuts, and also hot drinks – moved into its new North Street digs in November (2024) and to go with the renovations and re-opening had the shutters to the shop painted by Zippy (web) with the genderqueer symbol between barbed-wrapped daisies and linked chains.
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This spring ArtsEkta (web) will launch “Olive Tree House” as a new cultural hub in Belfast city centre with meeting-, studio-, and gallery-spaces. The name is a return to the original name of the building, used from 1958-2014, after which time it has been known as “Concentrix House” (Future Belfast) – Concentrix moved to Maysfield in 2017 (Concentrix). The building’s facade has been painted with olive trees by Zippy (web).
Fountain Street, Belfast
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“”As long as Ireland is unfree the only honourable attitude for Irish men and women is an attitude of rebellion” – Pádraıg Pearse”. Pearse wrote the lines in July 1913, in an essay for Irish Freedom (Cartlann), though with “revolt” rather than “rebellion”.
They appear here on an RNU gravestone in Milltown. The quote was also used in a 1980s mural in Ardoyne and on a 2018 plaque to Tommy Roberts in Derry.
The stone features the phoenix and the lily, and the crests of the four provinces of Ireland. It was unveiled in 2023 and an image of it was used in an RNU board on the Falls Road.
Among the volunteers listed are the four Ardoyne Fıanna who died in 1972 (commemorated in Ardoyne) and Michael McKevitt, founder and (alleged) chief of staff of the RIRA/Óglaıgh Na hÉıreann (WP) who died in 2021.
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Work by RAZER (ig) and NOYS (ig) of Peaball (web) at the Bullitt hotel/bar in Belfast city centre. With support from Seedhead Arts (web).
The final image is of a framed piece on the wall below these two, supporting Jameson whiskey’s “black barrel” variety (web).
Also at Bullitt: work by David McMillan in the alley-way and work by Rob Hilken on the Church Lane frontage.
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Paddy Duffy Collection 